Mobile chip designer ARM has told IDG that it plans to include support for multiple threads in its future processor designs. Just don't expect the new architecture to make it into your phone anytime soon.
Marketing manager Kumaran Siva told the news service that multithreaded performance was important to the company as it attempted to move out of the mobile space and into new market segments. ARM is thought to be eying the enterprise and networking segments and recently invested in Smooth-Stone, a start-up planning to build ARM-powered servers.
Siva told the news service that "we're looking at how we can address certain markets in the networking space that could potentially use multithreading in a way that is more beneficial".
Though strong performance in highly parallel applications is very important in the server market, ARM doesn't currently have any chip designs capable of handling large numbers of threads. On the other hand, companies like Oracle, IBM and Intel already offer support for multiple threads-per-core, while AMD will include the feature in its upcoming Bulldozer CPUs.
However, don't expect multi-threaded chips in your next mobile. Support was intentionally omitted from the upcoming Cortex-A15 design - which will power next-generation portable devices - as the company didn't feel that the performance gains could justify the expense. This means that it could be several years before we see any ARM chips that support multiple threads per core.
